Effects of Different Types of Variable Priority and Adaptive Training on Skill Acquisition in Dual Verbal-Spatial Working Memory Tasks

Abstract

The effects of two variable priority (or emphasis change) training paradigms (with 3 or 5 levels of emphasis) and an adaptive training paradigm on skill acquisition in dual verbal-spatial working memory tasks were examined. Competing hypotheses of the cognitive mechanisms of variable priority training were evaluated. All three training groups showed improved performance over a control group on the verbal working memory task. Only the variable priority groups showed an improvement over time relative to the control group in the spatial working memory task. The results support the hypothesis that variable priority training forces trainees to focus not only on easy tasks, but also on harder tasks, yielding more balanced task performance and higher levels of skill development. No evidence was found that variable priority training leads to the discovery of an optimal attention allocation strategy, or more efficient adaptation to changing task demands.